You saw the dejected looks of many players on the Pittsburgh Steelers last Saturday night in Indianapolis after blowing a 13-point lead to the Colts, giving up 30 unanswered points to result in a bad loss on the road. The loss dropped Pittsburgh to 7-7 and outside the AFC playoff field, sitting now as the 10th seed their road to the postseason looking rather bleak.
Steelers radio personality and color analyst Craig Wolfley jumped on The Irish Steelers Podcast to talk about the debacle in Indianapolis, stating that he saw Pittsburgh’s two prominent leaders of the team look defeated after another demoralizing loss, lacking the answers on how to keep this sinking ship afloat.
“I walked on the plane past Cam Heyward and T.J. Watt and I could see the miserableness in their face,” Wolfley said on The Irish Steelers podcast. “They know that game got away from them, but those are two of the most important guys that you can have to reload this stuff and pull people together. You gotta stick together. You gotta keep the voices to the outside of the four walls of the locker room.”
Any player would be disappointed after blowing a near two-touchdown lead to lose by 17 in a game that they felt that they had well in hand. Losing can be demoralizing for any player, regardless of how confident you may be in your own abilities or in your team. WR George Pickens mentioned the same following the Colts game, stating that losing the way Pittsburgh has will weigh on anyone’s emotions, even team leaders like Heyward and Watt, as the team has gone from being firmly in the playoff field to having a small chance of making it in after dropping three straight games.
Still, Heyward and Watt are the leaders in the locker room, as Wolfley mentioned, and those two are in charge of tuning out the outside noise and keeping this team together. Ben Roethlisberger said it best a week ago that the Steeler Way begins with the players holding each other accountable, not only for their play on the field, but also for the culture and the handling of issues off it. Heyward and Watt find themselves in the same position Roethlisberger once shared with guys like James Harrison and Troy Polamalu, holding the team to that standard of excellence.
Pittsburgh needs a victory in the worst way heading into Saturday’s matchup against the Cincinnati Bengals. Facing playoff elimination, Heyward and Watt need to be looked at to set the example both on the field as well as in the locker room. Each needs to be vocal on how the depths that Pittsburgh has sunk to is unacceptable and how this team must return to the standard that Pittsburgh had established by the greats before them.
